For the love of butter!

Rose themed wedding cake

This cake has been a labour of love all week. I worked out that I have spent 28 hours making roses and leaves out of sugar and a further 37 hours shopping, ordering supplies, baking, assembling and icing this monster of a cake. I have to say I am pretty tired, but it is the best kind of satisfied tired I have been in a long time.

I have learnt many lessons whilst making this cake. The most important lesson was letting the iced tiers dry separately before assembling together. Secondly, one must use a large pizza peel to move the cakes about without marking them. And thirdly, Royal icing is now my favourite icing as it sealed up any gaps between the tiers and smoothed over any unwanted cracks. If you are ever asked to make a wedding cake, think about where you buy your supplies from as you can easily cut costs by ordering cake boards, icing and boxes from warehouses. Making flowers takes time and should be started weeks before the wedding day, I accidentally dropped a few (which was heartbreaking) and it is a good idea to make more than you think you’ll need. Doweling is ESSENTIAL and shouldn’t be overlooked. I worked out that the cake weighs about 30kg and that poor fruit cake at the bottom has to support quite a lot of that weight. One must respect the fruit cake and stick many a dowel in it so that no caketastrophes occur (that is what Juliet Sear calls them).

Cakes should be transported SLOWLY and on a flat surface in the back a car (balancing a 30kg cake on a car seat is a disastrous idea). I was a great lover of google this week as every cake query I had was fixed in a matter of minutes. Now I know what to expect whilst making a wedding cake and I think the next one will be a lot easier (but not necessarily any lighter).